When the Lightning Network (LN) was conceived in 2015, it was quickly embraced by the Bitcoin community as the way to dramatically scale Bitcoin’s capacity. There was an expectation of LN being available quickly. Instead, development proceed more slowly in the background with different teams contributing to a standard specification. That spec is now almost ready and last year interest and early activity on the LN increased dramatically. We were joined by Christian Decker, a core engineer at Blockstream, where he works on their LN client. We discussed the history and progression of the LN and what remains on the road to scaling Bitcoin. Topics covered in this episode: How Christian ended up writing the world’s first PhD on Bitcoin The vision of the Lightning Network How the Lightning Network evolved in the last 4 years Approaching the 1.0 specification The current state of the network Why centralization concerns around hubs are often misguided eltoo and the future of lightning network The case against other chains being better layer 1 networks than Bitcoin Episode links: Lightning Network Whitepaper Christian Decker - Scaling Bitcoin with Duplex Micropayment Channels Joseph Poon & Tadge Dryja - Scalability and the Lightning Network Blockstream - Lightning Network A Simplified Update Mechanism for Lightning and Off-Chain Contracts Lightning Network Specifications on Github Thank you to our sponsors for their support: Simplify your hiring process & access the best blockchain talent . Get a $1,000 credit on your first hire at toptal.com/epicenter. Deploy enterprise-ready consortium blockchain networks that scale in just a few clicks. More at aka.ms/epicenter. This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sunny Aggarwal. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/273

The concept of DAOs has been captivating to many in the crypto space for years. When “The DAO” was created in 2016, in the few weeks of its existence and despite obvious flaws, it gather tremendous momentum and amassed 14% of the entire ether supply. Since then the technology has matured and Martin and Matan argue that the time for DAOs has finally arrived. We were joined by DAOstack Founder Matan Field and Gnosis Founder Martin Köppelmann. We talked about the decentralized exchange protocol DutchX. We also talked about how the two projects together created the dxDAO, which will manage the DutchX protocol, but could go onto its own path. A path that could even lead to being the DAO for all of DeFi. Topics covered in this episode: The unifying vision behind the various Gnosis projects Why Gnosis decided to build decentralized exchange protocol DutchX DutchX’s usage of batch auctions to provide good prices and liquidity for any market Incentivizing market makers with the Magnolia token Why the DutchX needs a DAO The role of Reputation in the dxDAO How Reputation will be distributed Why DAOs unlike companies could become more efficient as they grow How the dxDAO could become the biggest organization on earth in the next 10 years How one can get involved in the dxDAO Episode links: dxDAO Website Joint AMA: Martin Köppelmann & Matan Field - dxDAO DAOtalk.org Introducing the dxDAO A brief discussion of the protocol governing the dxDAO The DutchX as an Open Protocol Thank you to our sponsors for their support: Simplify your hiring process & access the best blockchain talent . Get a $1,000 credit on your first hire at toptal.com/epicenter. This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sunny Aggarwal. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/271